and I don’t believe that there are any “easy” answers when it comes to the topic of God and Gay. You can’t just sit out on your porch sipping lemonade and telling yourself that everything will be alright, despite the inferno raging just inside your doors.

Coming out is a process not an event. The process evolves over time and it can be painful at times, especialy when you bring religion into it…

I am a loving pseudo-spouse, gay, proud and this is my story.

I was never raised strictly religous. My family went to church three times a year and whenever we wer at my grandmothers. Yeah one of THOSE christians i guess… somewhere arround middle/junior high i took a foray into really trying to find god… find meaning… find substance. and right about then i started to recognise that i was different. I didn’t understand why the boys in my class were cuter then the girls… or why i would have “those” kind of dreams… I never talked about it… but i know other people could see it. i digress… i was trying to find god… but the more i read and the more i was told and the more i participated in church, the worse i started to feel about myself. the more i started to try and hide who i was. i started to become depressed and withdrawn… Why would i want to be a part of somethign that would make me feel so wrong…

in the beginning i merely didn’t understand, i knew but i couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that i was gay. but by the point i completely turned my back to religion it was already too late… i was hurt and the scar is hard to heal. To me it’s sad that religion could do this to someone. that somethign that’s supposed to be centered around love and understanding and family and all that is good and pure…could break someone downt to the point that they would sit in bed at night contemplating ways to end it all… without even having to say a word… So, Yeah i rejected my faith (which to be honest wasn’t THAT strong in the first place) but i never rejected god. throughout my life i’ve always known he was there waiting for me… sitting on that porch sipping away on his lemonade… whistling a long forgotten tune… knowing that i’d be down that road eventually…

Anyway… (yeah i know i’m all over the place…) Long story short… I don’t understand why a theology centered around love could be so steeped in fear and hate (for one begot the other)…that it would rather choose to condemn than understand. I in no way claim to be a scholor on the subject of theology… but one thing i do know is that god is has been and will be there waiting for me to come home. reguardless of who i choose to love. Reguardless of what beliefs others will try to force upon me… Reguardless of what path i take in life…

one story i seem to remember from bible school…is the on in which a Pious mand and a murder are stood before god… the pious man stood there chest raised head high bible in hand spouting all the good he had done in his life quoting scriture and carrying on about how he was so offended to be shown in the same company as this murder… yet the murder upon setting eyes on god…fell to his knees sobbing… begging forgivness… needless to say the Pious man was outraged when the murder gained gods attention and favor…merely because he saw the sincerity in the mans heart that he was truly repentant of his sins… GOD WILL BE THE FINAL JUDGE OF YOUR CHARACTER… You shall not be admitted nor excluded from heaven on works alone… it is you character of heart and spirit that he will see… at least that’s what i remember of it…

I RARELY put much worth into the judgement of others. you can love me or hate me… i’m not trying to impress anyone… God knows i’m a good person and that’s enough for me… judge not least thee be judged… i could go on like this for hours…i’ve had a few years to think about it… at anyrate… i don’t care what others may say, it’s what god tells me that really matters… and he tells me that there is nothign wrong with the love me and my boyfriend share. 😉

Welcome Joe, its so cool to hear your story 😀 I can see why John loves you so much (well just these short bits speak heaps and that you came on to support him, omggggggg sooooooo gorgeous)……Its great to have a couple interacting together like this on the forum…… 😉 😀

That is the problem though… a lot of the christian community is and continues to be homophobic. for me at least… from my dealings with and my experience there in.

the religion it self may not be but it teaches its followers to be homophobic. I have heard pastors preach numerous sermons on the evils of homosexuality and the immoral nature. where i felt that no part of what i do is immoral. at least no less moral than what the straight members sitting next to me are doing. who is anyone to draw the line in the sand and say that if i stand on this side i’m immoral, if i’m on this other side i’m not… GOD. In my life he has the final say… not the pastor, preacher, godly man quoting vaguely obscure scripture twisted around to help prove his point. i could argue that premarital sex is just as immoral as what i do… however the young couple that’s living together doesn’t get thrown under the proverbial bus… To me it’s a Moot point… there’s no use in arguing that christianity is a loving religion but you have to draw the line as to where the love stops… I was always tought that love, when truly and fully given, as god gives, should be unconditional… not defined by only ifs.

I do feel very passionate about this topic… and i love talking about it… don’t worry you’re not going to offend me… the thing is… i do see the bible as GODs word…as interpreted by MAN… two thousand years ago…

What dose this have to do with the topic at hand. Christians preaching (in my eyes) hate and fear for a complete sub-sect of society, when the BIBLE itself preaches love and understanding…

I very seriously doubt that, had i lived in his time, Jesus would have chastised me or looked down on me for the choices i have made in my life… No where in the bible have i ever seen or been told of a passage in which Jesus condems any person male or female for loving someone in a homoerotic way.

So why should a preacher stand on his pulpit and cast stones…

You’re right jesus didn’t condemn cutting down the rain forests(if he even knew they existed in that day) or the beating of grand-ma…

***** WARNING…LIBERAL STATEMENT ABOUT TO BE MADE********

But who am i to say that you can’t do those things… what people do in their own lives is their own deal… they have to live with the consequences of their actions and i leave it up to GOD himself to make the distinction… and how can you even begin to compare my loving my boyfriend with all of my heart to the beating of my grandmother… furthermore… i don’t see the relation between cutting down the rainforests and sin… i don’t agree with the raping of our one and only world… but i don’t see it as being sinful… that’s more of a socio-environmental issue than a moral issue…

however, we digress… I’m trying still to wrap my brain around the idea of a love/ faith based religion in which GOD himself has the right to judge my actions, not the bible, nor any other earthly being. so how is it you can preach one thing e.g. love, understanding, acceptance, when you practice the polar opposite.